


Prodigal Children

by melimarron



Category: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children - Ransom Riggs, Wayward Children Series - Seanan McGuire
Genre: Gen, I HAVE NO INPUT FROM A NORMAL ADULT, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I am very tired, Not Beta Read, THIS IS A PRODUCT OF A TIRED HUMAN BEING'S MIND, basically if miss p had been just a few hours late at the end of library of souls, damn im tired, definitely not map of days compliant, go me, i am terrible at keeping people in character, i can be very cheesy, i managed to keep it to a minimum here by only having 3 canon characters, i seriously love both of these fandoms, oneshot I guess, well i guess it could be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-01-20 21:31:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21288494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melimarron/pseuds/melimarron
Summary: At the end of Library of Souls, Miss Peregrine and the rest of the peculiars save Jacob from being taken away, just in the nick of time. But what if they were a little too late? What if Jacob was taken, and ended up at Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children, because by any definition of the word, Jacob did wander- not into a different world, but a different time?Spoilers for Library of Souls. Minor spoilers for Every Heart a Doorway. You don't have to have read Every Heart a Doorway to read this, but it'll help.
Relationships: None
Kudos: 19





	Prodigal Children

**Author's Note:**

> It's not necessary to have read Every Heart a Doorway to read this, although I do recommend it- it's a great book. It IS necessary to have read Library of Souls, though, because there are spoilers. I tried to keep the Every Heart a Doorway spoilers to a minimum.  
Enjoy!

The monotony of no longer being among peculiars had yet to fade when Jacob Portman’s life was changed, again.

For the past few weeks (although they felt like months), Jacob had been kept in total isolation. No phone, no computer, no internet, no contacting his new friends. Even Emma had stopped writing to him.

Jacob sat in his room, reading a book for what felt like the thousandth time. Ever since he’d been found in England, talking about people with powers and World War Two and children who never grew up, his parents had been watching him closely. They’d even invited two of his uncles to the house- the biggest, strongest, people in the Portman family. Just in case Jacob finally cracked and tried to either murder his family or run away again.

No matter how many times he tried to explain to his family that he had _changed_, that he had gone on an adventure and hadn’t been lying about birds that turned into women or monstrous beings that used to be people, he was always met with a worried look and a “That’s… nice, Jacob. Maybe you should write a book?”

In other words, _stop sounding like you’re going to murder us all in our sleep, please, Jacob_.

“Jacob, sweetheart, we need to talk to you,” his mother called from downstairs. “Please?”

Everyone was walking on eggshells around him now. _Don’t upset the crazy kid who somehow managed to travel from an island with only one way off or on to London without anyone seeing him at all_. With a groan, Jacob put the book down, not bothering to mark the page. He’d read it so many times in the past few weeks it didn’t matter what page he was on. He stood and walked down the stairs.

His mother and father were waiting for him in the living room. As always, his two uncles who were probably secretly bodybuilders lurked in the rooms closest to the living room, technically giving them privacy, but also fully prepared to run in at the first scream of _Jacob, what are you doing, stop strangling your mother_.

“What is it?” he asked nervously. “Are you finally going to lock me up?”

“Jacob!” his mother said, offended. “We’d never-”

“I saw the pamphlets.” Jacob said. “Places for mentally unwell teenagers.”

His parents traded an uneasy look. “We’re not going to lock you up, as you so delightfully put it,” his mother said, “ but we do think that it’s in your best interest to… try to re-acclimatize yourself to the world.”

“I’m normal!” Jacob said. “I’m normal, okay? You can’t send me away.”

“We’re not saying you aren’t normal,” his father said quickly. “_But_ I agree with your mother. It is in your best interests for you to spend more time with your peers, maybe try therapy again-”

Jacob remembered his last therapist in violent detail. Dr. Golan had kidnapped Miss Peregrine and had tried to kill him and everyone else under Miss Peregrine’s care. Jacob had been forced to kill Dr. Golan instead. “I don’t _need_ another therapist.”

His father shook his head. “We just want what’s best for you. Look, it’s not a hospital or anything like that. It’s a boarding school. It helps people who aren’t so… in touch with the real world.”

“I’m in touch with the real world!” Jacob protested.

“Just for one year, okay, Jake?” his mother said.

Jacob shook his head. “I’m not crazy!”

His mother sighed and stepped forward. “Please, Jacob. Please. It’s only for a year. If you don’t like it, you can drop out. Besides, you’ve been wanting to get out of Florida for a while, right?”

“Yeah, I got out, and now you think I’m crazy!”

“We _don’t_ think you’re crazy, Jacob, we just think that you should at least try this out. Just for a year. Just to try to- to be _you_ again, like before your grandfather’s death.”

His grandfather’s death. The event that had spurred him on to look closer at his grandfather’s past, that had eventually led him to a world where the same day repeated over and over and he wasn’t just a normal kid, he was _special_, he was _peculiar_, and he had people who cared about him. Real friends, not just friends who only tolerated his presence like Ricky. “I don’t _want_ to be like I was before Grandpa Portman died.”

“Jacob, please,” his mother said again. “First you watched him be mauled by those dogs, and then you ran away. We just want you to be more stable.”

“I _am_ stable, Mom. Those weren’t dogs, they were hollows, and I’m the only one who can see them. And I _didn’t_ run away, not on purpose. They _needed_ me.”

“_Who_ needed you, Jacob?” From her pocket, his mother pulled out a letter. “Your “girlfriend”? The one who supposedly sent you this letter?” She put mocking air quotes around the word “girlfriend”.

Jacob felt his eyes widening. Emma hadn’t forgotten about him after all! “That’s mine!”

“I thought we weren’t going to show him that until he agreed!” his father said, reaching over and pulling the letter out of Jacob’s mother’s hands and holding it above his head. With despair, Jacob realized that there was no way he’d be able to get the letter, even if he jumped.

“I’ll go if you give me that letter.” Jacob said. “I won’t complain. I promise I won’t. I just need that letter. Please. I’ll go, I’ll go. I promise. Please.”

“Good,” his mother said briskly. “Go pack your things. We’re leaving tomorrow.”

“What about my letter?” Jacob demanded, trying not to think about what the future would hold now that he had agreed to go to the school. One of the friends he had made when he had “run away”, Horace, could see the future in dreams. _If only Horace were here…_

Actually, if any of the peculiars he’d made friends with were here, he wouldn’t be going to any boarding school at all. Emma could show his parents that she could literally summon fire. Bronwyn could lift something really heavy and throw it at his parents or something. Miss Peregrine could turn into a bird and scare the living daylights out of his parents. Millard could- well, Millard could put some clothes on and demonstrate his invisibility. Claire could terrify his parents with her second mouth. Enoch could summon his army of creepy doll things. Olive could float around on the ceiling. Hugh could summon his army of bees. It would be indisputable proof that Jacob wasn’t crazy.

But none of them were here, not even Emma. He was alone.

“We’ll give you your letter when we get to the school,” his mother said firmly. “Remember to pack enough for a year away.”

“Because you’ve given me _so much time_ to prepare for something like that.” Jacob said. “Is there, like, a uniform or something?”

His parents looked at each other. “I don’t… the woman we talked to didn’t say anything about that,” his father said. “Just pack normal clothes. _Not_ those things you arrived in. We bought you a new suitcase since you… lost the other one.”

“Okay, whatever. Can I go now?”

His parents nodded in unison.

Jacob turned and left the room, passing his uncles, one of whom had fallen asleep and the other of whom was raiding the kitchen. The one raiding the kitchen gave him a nasty smile as he passed. “Good luck in the loony bin, Jake.”

“Don’t call me Jake.” Jacob shot back and headed up the stairs to his room.

When he got there, he went to his closet. Where was that new suitcase his father had mentioned? He looked around the room. There. A blue suitcase sat underneath the bed, a little larger than his old red suitcase that was now at the bottom of the ocean-and had been since 1940.

Jacob pulled the suitcase out from under the bed and started pulling clothing from his closet and shoving it into his bag. He just hoped that he’d have some kind of access to a mailbox at this boarding school.

* * *

Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children looked beautiful from the outside. Jacob stared at it, squeezed into the middle seat of a rental car between his two uncles, each of whom gripped an arm like they were afraid Jacob would make a run for it. The gardens were particularly spectacular, with flowers blooming and the yard neatly trimmed.

It reminded Jacob of Cairnholm, with it’s sunny days and the old building that narrowly escaped being bombed every day. The names were even similar- Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children and Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children.

The car shuddered to a stop in the parking lot, and for a moment, nobody moved. Jacob knew that he wasn’t moving because his uncles were still valiantly trying to cut off all blood supply to his hands, and moving would be incredibly difficult. But why everyone else was still sitting like they had decided to spontaneously die was a mystery to him.

Then the uncle to Jacob’s right got out of the car with a huff. “Let me get your stuff, Jake,” he said, eager to be rid of his nephew. “This place looks _fantastic_.”

“Oh, it really does!” Jacob’s mother squealed. “I’m _so_ jealous, Jacob.”

“Maybe you can come here when you’re declared insane by a trained psychiatrist,” the uncle to Jacob’s left said. “Isn’t the goal here to get him back as soon as possible? When he’s _normal_ again?”

“_He_ is right here.” Jacob said irritably as he slid out after the uncle who’d offered to get his things out of the trunk.

He stood up, blinking in the bright sunlight. His uncle closed the trunk with a slam and shoved a backpack and the blue suitcase at Jacob. “Here you go, Jake.”

“Don’t call me Jake.” Jacob said.

“Yeah, yeah.”

Jacob turned away from his uncle and towards the school, slinging his backpack over his shoulder and lifting a hand to shade his eyes. “So this is the school?”

“Yep,” his father said. “Looks fun!”

“It looks like a house, Dad.”

“It was _converted_ into a school,” his father said. “You’ll have to tell me if you see any cool birds while you’re here!”

“Lots of cuckoo birds, I bet,” one of Jacob’s uncles said with a guffaw.

Jacob felt his face settle into a scowl. “Can I just _go_ already?” He didn’t particularly want to go inside, and end up locked up with someone who was actually insane, but anything was better than staying with his uncles for another second.

His mother, who had stayed inside the car, said, “Don’t you want us to come in with you, sweetheart?” Her tone suggested that she didn’t really want to, but figured it was appropriate to ask anyway.

“I’m _fine_. Okay? See you next year.”

His father gave Jacob a quick hug, then got back into the car. His uncles squeezed themselves back into the back seat. Jacob wondered how there had ever been enough room in the car for him to sit there, between them. Then the car backed out of its parking space, and the Portman family was off, heading back to the airport, leaving Jacob alone on the front steps, staring up at the school.

Jacob stepped forward, dragging his suitcase behind him. As he walked, he noticed people out on the lawns. Most were around his age, but there were a few younger kids, maybe twelve or thirteen. A few were watching him suspiciously, while others watched the rental car with equal suspicion and- maybe- hatred. Most ignored Jacob, too wrapped up in whatever they were doing to bother to think about him.

The front door was as majestic as the rest of the house. Jacob stepped up to it hesitantly, then slowly opened the door and stepped inside.

The front hall was plain, but still ornate. Jacob barely had any time to take in any details before a woman, maybe in her sixties, swept down the stairs, her hand resting lightly on the banister and with the most colorful clothing Jacob had ever seen on a human being. She wore a bright blue sweater and neon yellow pants. There was a necklace of stones around her neck.

“Um.” Jacob said. “Hi.”

“Hello,” the woman said. “You must be Jacob. I’m Eleanor West. Welcome to my home.”

“Um. Yeah. I’m Jacob. Hi. How did you know?”

“Well, you’re the only one I was expecting today. Now, where did you go?”

“What?”

“You don’t have many signs of having gone anywhere, except for your parents’ account of the monsters you fought.”

“I- okay, I know they aren’t real.” Jacob said quickly. He wasn’t about to start talking about hollows and loops and second souls in front of a strange woman. “It’s- it was just dogs. Big, rabid, dogs. I was confused.”

“Please don’t use the r-word while you’re here. Nothing is real, not truly. Now. I know you went _somewhere_ when you went abroad this summer. It’ll be a nice change to have you. We mostly get girls here. So where did you go?”

“I got lost on the island and, um, I- I went to London. That’s it. I swear.”

“I know you went somewhere,” Miss West repeated. “I myself went to a Nonsense world. You don’t seem to have any Nonsense traits. I’d say- perhaps a Logical world? Unless it’s one of the minor directions?”

“I never left Earth.” Jacob said, baffled.

“You didn’t?” Miss West was starting to look a little worried. “You don’t have to lie here, you know. We’ll understand what you went through, here.”

“I…” Jacob hesitated. _Okay, fine. This woman is clearly crazy. Nobody would believe her if she told anyone about me._ “I went to September third, in 1940.”

“A _time_ traveler.” Miss West said, sounding both confused and relieved. “How interesting. I don’t think we’ve ever had anyone who actually went to a different time. How did that happen, may I ask?”

“I was exploring the island.” Jacob said. “I wanted to know more about my grandfather, and I saw this girl in this house I was in, and she ran away. So I followed her, and we went through this really bright light, and then it was 1940.” He paused. “Are you peculiar?”

“Please, don’t use words like that while you’re here.” Miss West said.

“What, _peculiar_?” Jacob asked. “But I’m peculiar. It’s not an insult, or anything. I guess I could say, uh, _syn-dri-gas-ti_ if it really bothers you, but I, um, never really figured out how to pronounce that.”

Miss West looked thoughtful. “They called you… _peculiar_, at your home?”

“Yeah.”

“Perhaps you should just refrain from using that word in the presence of the other students. They might take it the wrong way and the next we’d see of you, you’d be dead of disembowelment.”

Jacob gulped. “Is that a real worry here?”

“Occasionally.” Miss West said gravely. “We had someone a few years back who tried to return home by way of murder. It worked, but… not in the way anyone was expecting it to work.”

“Oh.” Jacob said. That was concerning. _This place is _nothing_ like Miss P’s loop._

“So, then. World War Two. In… where did you find your door? Were you transported to a battle in the war or just to a place during the war?”

“I didn’t fight in World War Two.” Jacob said. “I went to an island, Cairnholm, with my dad. The island got bombed, in the war. The loop I found took place on the day before it got bombed, on September third, 1940. Miss P- the ymbryne who made the loop- looped that day over and over.”

Miss West blinked. “All right, then. It sounds to me that since Earth is Nonsense and Wicked, I’ll put you in with someone who’ll fit that.”

Jacob felt his mouth drop open. _Wicked?_ She thought that loops and peculiars and Earth were _wicked?_ “I’m not _wicked_.”

“Not you. Your world. You stayed on Earth, and since Earth is Nonsense and Wicked- although Kade disagrees with me on the _Nonsense_ part- you’re going to have a roommate who will complement your traits from the… loop, you said?”

“Yeah. Yeah, Miss Peregrine’s loop.”

“Very well. Now, dinner is at six pm. You’ll have group therapy afterwards. It’s not as good as therapy with Lundy was, but…” Miss West trailed off.

“Therapy?” Jacob asked warily. “Does the therapist have contact lenses?”

“Not that I’m aware of.” Miss West said. “Your orientation will be tomorrow morning, in the same room as the group therapy. Do you have any questions?”

“Yeah, um, is there anyone like me? People who went to loops? Peculiar people?”

“I’m afraid not. If there are, I am not aware of them.” Miss West said. “I’ll show you to your room. Follow me.” She turned and started to walk up the stairs again without giving Jacob a chance to answer.

Jacob followed her, trying to ignore the queasiness in his stomach as he lifted his bags and started up the stairs. No peculiars here. That almost made a sick kind of sense. Of course there wouldn’t be any peculiars. Caul had murdered so many- the chances of anyone here having a second soul were low. Especially since any peculiar here wouldn’t have had an ymbryne to protect them.

Miss West led him to the second floor and down a hallway. She stopped in front of one of the doors, turned to Jacob, and put a finger to her lips. “Your roommate,” she said quietly, “went to a rather quiet world. He doesn’t like noise at all.”

Jacob blinked. “Uh, okay. I’ll be quiet.”

She nodded and knocked on the door softly.

The door opened quickly, a few seconds after her knock, and nearly soundlessly. “Yes?” the boy who’d opened the door asked, his voice barely above a whisper. He was a blond-haired, blue-eyed boy, taller than Jacob, and wore noise-canceling headphones over his ears.

“You have a new roommate, Frank.” Miss West told him, her own voice quiet, though she was still louder than the boy. “This is Jacob.”

“Hey.” Jacob said, trying to keep his voice quiet.

The boy visibly winced at Jacob’s voice, despite his noise-canceling headphones. He turned to Miss West. “Couldn’t you have found me someone who appreciates the information found in _silence_?” Despite his soft voice, the sharpness of his tone and the glint in his eyes displayed his anger.

“Sorry.” Jacob said.

The boy sighed again. “At least you’re not screaming all the time, like my last roommate. He kept trying to _fix_ me. Dick. Come on in.”

Jacob shuffled into the room as Miss West left the doorway and started off down the hallway. The boy closed the door behind Jacob, obviously trying to be as quiet as humanly possible. Jacob wondered where this kid had gone, if he could hear so well that any noises above a whisper were painful to him, even with noise-canceling headphones on.

“I’m Frank,” the boy announced in his incredibly soft voice. “I went to Kakushodani, a place where all noise is forbidden. I slayed the Alarm Lord with a knife made of silent applause, and killed all those who dared disturb the holy silence. I was released from service when at my fifteenth birthday, the Lady of Silence threw me out for the noise of the blood rushing through my veins and heart.”

Jacob frowned. “But you can’t help that.”

“It was excused, when I was younger.” Frank said sadly. “But I forgot that I had to learn how to be completely silent. Now, I’m just as loud as any of you noisemakers. Where did you go, if I can ask that?”

“1940.” Jacob said. “I, um…” He thought back to his adventures with his peculiar friends, trying to make any of his achievements sound as impressive as killing someone with a knife made of silent applause. “I could talk to monsters, and control them, I guess. And I, um, I killed a lot of people. Well, not people. More monsters. And I... I guess I traveled through time. I stayed on Earth, though.”

Frank raised an eyebrow. “Then you’re not really one of us, are you? You stayed here. You just went _time travelling_. You didn’t discover anything. You didn’t go _home_.”

Jacob scowled at him. “I also discovered a secret world of people who have special abilities, like me. _That_ was my home. My home, and my grandfather’s! The only reason I’m not there now is because it got _blown up_ by _Nazis_!”

As he spoke, unintentionally loudly, Frank curled into a ball, hands over his headphones, pressing them into his ears in an obvious effort to stop Jacob from sounding so loud. Jacob fell silent, watching Frank, all curled up in a ball. If Jacob apologized, he’d just be making Frank listen to more noise. Would that be worse? But at the same time, Frank had insulted his home, had said that he, Jacob, wasn’t _really_ supposed to be here. Jacob had been offended at that, though he didn’t know why.

“Sorry,” he said weakly.

Frank sat up slowly and didn’t answer, instead choosing to throw Jacob a glare and made an odd movement with his hands, like a strange sort of sign language. Had he learned that in his… world? His home? Then, Frank pushed past Jacob and left the room, moving soundlessly the entire time.

Jacob was left alone in the room, with only his suitcase and backpack for company.

He swallowed his guilt for upsetting Frank and slowly started to unpack. He pulled out slightly wrinkled clothing and started to put it in drawers. He’d be okay. He’d adjust to being outside of a loop, away from peculiarity, eventually.

It wasn’t like he had a choice.

* * *

Dinner.

A necessary evil.

Still annoying, though.

As the new kid, Jacob, of course, would have no idea where to sit. Eventually, he decided that after getting his food, he would sit next to Frank and hope that Frank didn’t hate him for being too loud. If Frank didn’t go to dinner, seeing as how dinner was probably going to be loud, Jacob would be lost.

Miss West introduced him as “Jacob Portman, a _time_ traveller,” like that was some kind of special achievement when all the other kids in the room were, like, kings and queens and Chosen Ones and magic users.

Just his luck, Frank wasn’t there for dinner. If he was, Jacob couldn’t find him. So he sat in a relatively empty area and hoped for the best.

The majority of the students at the school were female, he noticed. That was kind of weird. Wouldn't a coed school have to be around fifty-fifty for boys and girls?

As he ate, he ended up accidentally eavesdropping on other kids. Nobody was going out of their way to talk to him, so Jacob just ate his sandwich in peace and tried to ignore the others.

The plan to ignore everyone failed when he overheard a conversation one girl nearby was having with a friend.

“Look,” the girl nearby said, brandishing her phone at her friend, “this girl tried to set fire to a house in Florida. People said her _hands_ were on _fire_!”

“Florida Man is at it again,” her friend said dully.

Offended, Jacob opened his mouth to say that he was from Florida, thank you very much, but then he realized what the girl had said. _People said her hands were on fire_. Emma?

_No,_ he told himself firmly. _No. It isn’t her. She’s in a loop. Not here. Not in the twenty-first century. Don’t get your hopes up, Jacob. You’re not going home that way._

“I bet it’s someone who traveled to earth, like Rini!” the first girl said excitedly. “Maybe she’s coming for one of us! Maybe she’ll bring someone home!”

“Didn’t you go to a Logical world?” her friend asked. “Why would a girl who can summon fire be from _your_ home?”

“Well, maybe she’s from your home,” the first girl said. “You went to an icy world, didn’t you? Where it was so cold people started to be able to summon fire with their hands?”

“Yeah,” her friend said, “but if you lecture me on how _that’s not possible_ one more time, I will remind you that I went to a _Nonsense_ world, so it is possible.”

The first girl lifted her hands innocently. “I wasn’t going to. I swear.”

“Anyway,” her friend said sadly, “they kicked me out. They won’t be sending anyone after me. More likely that’s a confused kid who just got kicked out and burned her parents’ place down when she realized she couldn’t go back.”

The first girl sighed, more subdued now. “Yeah. You’re probably right.”

Jacob stood up, his sandwich stuck in his throat. With a small cough, he walked away from the dinner table and tried not to think about Emma.

* * *

Group therapy that night required Jacob to talk a little about peculiarity. Dinner had been all right, if he ignored the girl who had mentioned not-Emma. Bland, nothing like the food he’d briefly enjoyed before the island was bombed. At least it was better than the food he’d eaten while on the run from the wights.

“Jacob,” the therapist said. He was a man, maybe in his thirties or forties. Everyone was sitting in a circle, looking like they very much did not want to be there at all, especially Frank, who was sitting near Jacob with a towel wrapped around his head, like that was going to help muffle the few noises that got through his headphones. “You’re new. Would you like to share?” His tone implied that there wasn’t a choice involved. Jacob had already forgotten his name. It was a miracle he remembered Frank’s name.

_No_. “All right,” Jacob mumbled.

“What?” The therapist asked, smiling wickedly. He seemed to have a sadistic love of torturing the students and making them _share their trauma_. The man hadn’t even been to a different world. Miss West had just hired him after the first therapist had been gruesomely murdered by a student, which had apparently scared off all of the _competent_ job-seekers. Jacob didn’t know why the first therapist had been murdered, but if the first therapist was anything like this one, then one of the students had probably gotten fed up with “sharing” and just straight up stabbed the therapist.

“All _right_, I said.” Jacob repeated. “Okay, I didn’t go to a different world. I went to a different time. I, um. I got to fight these giant… things, with tentacles in their mouths. Then I got to control them. Um, I went to 1940.”

“How _in_teresting. A different _time_.” The therapist said. “A round of applause for Jacob, please, for sharing.”

A weak round of applause sounded around the room. The whispers were far stronger than the applause. _A different _time_? Who is he kidding? He should just suck it up and admit he really went to another world, like the rest of us. He even fooled Miss West. Screw him._

Jacob straightened up in his chair. “It’s true,” he insisted. “I went to Miss Peregrine’s loop, and it was always sunny there until it got bombed and my friends and I had to go save the ymbrynes!”

Surprisingly, nobody asked for clarification on what an ymbryne was, or a loop. “That sounds more like a real door,” one of the girls in the circle said approvingly, still quiet. “Not like a Wicked world.”

“Yeah, yeah, and then there’s a sob story,” another girl spat. “Let me guess- everything was great until you had to go on an adventure to save your friends, and then you got kicked out and now you can’t go home.”

“I wasn’t kicked out!” Jacob said. “I _chose_ to leave!”

“Yeah, you _chose_,” the girl said. “You chose your world, and now you’re stuck here, like the rest of us! _None_ of us are going home!”

Gasps spread around the circle like wildfire. Frank put his hands over his ears and shook his head, like that would erase what the girl had said.

“I’m going back,” Jacob said. “I’m going back. My friends will find me, or I’ll find a loop, and I’ll get out of here! I’m _always_ going to be able to go back! Loops don’t _have_ an age limit!”

“Everyone says that at first,” the girl said scornfully. “When you realize that you’re here to stay, don’t come crying to me.”

With that, the girl stood and left the room, ignoring the therapist’s half hearted attempts to call her back.

_Maybe I _did_ go through a door_, Jacob thought. _She was able to tell what I had done with my friends too easily. Maybe the peculiar world is a parallel Earth, and I just stumbled onto it._

That was impossible. If Cairnholm and peculiarity were parallel universes, then how did the hollows get all the way here to be hunted by and then kill Grandpa Portman? How had he and the other peculiars slipped so easily from time period to time period, as quickly and easily as simply walking through a loop, if they’d been walking into parallel realities?

No, he hadn’t gone through a door to another world. He’d gone through a loop to another time. But he’d found home, all the same. And he was going to go back. No matter what anyone said.

* * *

After therapy, Jacob walked back down to the cafeteria and sat on one of the benches. He’d have to do his homework _sometime_, and he wasn’t totally clear on where the library was, if this place did have a library.

The news was on a TV nearby. Jacob wasn’t really listening to it, but it was comforting to have some kind of background noise as he worked.

“...And speaking of weird things happening today,” someone on the news said, “we have the strange reports, all over the country, of a falcon of some kind flying into hospitals- what’s your opinion on that, Adam?”

Jacob’s head jerked up from his homework. _Falcons flying into hospitals_. It couldn’t be them. It couldn’t. They were stuck in their loop, in 1908. It _couldn’t_ be his friends.

But maybe it was a twenty-first century ymbryne, who was trying to find him, or another peculiar. Maybe if he could find this other ymbryne and ask her to take him to a loop, then he could find his way back to his friends, back _home_-

No. It was just a normal bird. He couldn’t get his hopes up. He’d been at Eleanor West’s for less than a day. They couldn’t be looking for him, not yet. Who would even notice that he was missing? Emma would assume that he’d found someone else, like his grandfather had. And she wouldn’t be able to find him anyway, not trapped in a loop.

He shook his head firmly and bent back over his homework, more determined than ever to ignore the TV. Maybe Frank had an extra pair of noise-canceling headphones Jacob could borrow.

His hopes of ignoring the TV were dashed by a pair of girls walking by. He didn’t recognize either of them, but that didn’t mean much. They were talking about the news. Jacob glared down at his homework and tried to ignore them as best they could.

“Okay, weirdest thing you’ve heard on the news today, go,” one of the girls said. “Like, weirdest thing, ever. Other worlds don’t count.”

“What about the government? Does that count?”

“No, that’s a normal weird. An insane weird. So not the government.”

“Okay. Um… that one, you know, with the girl in the café who shoved her sandwich at the back of her head.”

Jacob turned around. _Claire_. “What was that about the weird girl?” he asked.

The girls who’d been talking looked down at him blankly. “It’s nothing. Nothing to do with any homes,” one of them said. Then the two of them continued to walk, one of them glancing back at him.

“You know,” one of them said as they walked away, “when I came back, I’d only missed a week. Seven days for my parents, seven years for me. And it was during that week that Trump got elected. Third nastiest shock of my life. The first two being, obviously, finding my door and then getting kicked out.”

“Yeah, _obviously_,” the other said.

“Hey, did you hear about that boy who robbed a graveyard? He said he was trying to raise the dead- do you think he went to the Moors?”

“I heard he was stealing stuff from the bodies, like- well, you remember…?”

“Oh, _God_. Don’t remind me. She was a terrible person, but _damn_, I respect her dedication to getting home. I’d do the same if I thought it’d work.”

“I’ll make sure to hold onto my brain and eyes and hands when you’re around.”

“Aw, don’t you trust me?”

Laughing, the two girls left the cafeteria, leaving Jacob to mull over what he had heard.

_A girl who nearly set fire to a house. Emma. A falcon in a hospital. Miss Peregrine. A girl who eats strangely. Claire. A boy who robbed a graveyard to raise the dead. Enoch._

Had his friends really escaped the loop? Were they trying to get to him? But how? They were stuck in a loop! They couldn’t leave without _dying_! How was this possible?

_It isn’t,_ Jacob told himself firmly. _It isn’t. They’re not coming for you. They wouldn’t even know where you are. They would come if they could, but they can’t, so don’t go getting your hopes up._

He packed up his books and went back to his room.

* * *

Over the next two weeks, Jacob managed to settle into a kind of routine. Get up, eat breakfast, go to class, eat lunch, go to class, eat dinner, go to therapy, do homework, and go to sleep. Every day, he tried to keep an ear out for more news that could possibly relate to peculiars, but every day, he was disappointed.

On the weekends, he went out to the woods to try to be alone, away from the mutters of _thinks he’s better than us, Jacob Portman and his time travel and staying on Earth and open door_. Then he figured out that the woods were the exact wrong place he should be if he wanted to be alone. After that, he simply took to hiding in his room. Frank ignored him, for the most part, and only acknowledged Jacob’s presence if he was too loud.

Jacob did have to eat meals in the cafeteria, though, which was growing more and more unbearable by the day. People had started to whisper about him, taking what he’d spilled during therapy and running with it. _His door’s always going to be open, and he’s here with us, the asshole. What does _he_ know about being kicked out of your home? What does _he_ know about us and what we’ve been through? Lucky dick. Look at him, sitting there. What’s he even doing here? He could just leave anytime. Just go. Nobody wants you here._

If they weren’t whispering about him, it seemed that they’d be ignoring him. To be fair, it wasn’t like Jacob was making an effort to make friends. The ignoring, at least, was mutual.

On the evening of Jacob’s fifteenth dinner at Eleanor West’s, he _finally_ overheard a new piece of news that might- _might_\- be related to peculiars. A girl walking past had yelped and pulled at her friend’s sleeve, stopping at the windows. “Hey! Look, it’s a flying girl!”

Jacob leaped out of his seat. “Olive,” he breathed, and ran for the windows.

“That’s clearly a balloon, Amy,” the girl’s friend said, squinting up at the cloudy sky. “Look, there’s a rope.”

Jacob was almost at the window when a foot appeared out of nowhere and tripped him, sending him sailing face-first into the floor.

“Whoops,” his tripper said, utter glee in their voice. “Sorry, I thought you’d just keep going and fall back into your home. Anyway, what are you doing, running for the windows? Don’t you have an open door to find?”

_I’m trying,_ Jacob thought furiously, slowly getting to his feet._ I’m trying, okay?_

* * *

Jacob sat down for his sixteenth dinner at Eleanor West’s home and tried to ignore the whispers. _Says he’s a time traveller. Calls himself peculiar. Sees stuff nobody else can. And he insists that his door will always be open, the lucky bastard. Are we sure he’s not schizophrenic?_

As he reached for his spoon, he suddenly felt cold noodles snaking down his back. “Hey!” he said, his voice a little higher than normal. Someone had poured their soup on him.

“You don’t belong here. Go back to your door,” his attacker hissed, before running off.

Jacob snarled, standing up and turning. He tried to threaten his attacker in hollow, just to freak the rest of the kids out, and ended up only growling out “_Cold_,” which wasn’t really the menacing effect he was going for. Nevertheless, nobody else in the room could understand him, so at least he didn’t completely embarrass himself any more than he already had.

After the sudden attack by way of food, Jacob dragged himself back to his room and slammed open the door to his room, too angry to care about being ridiculously quiet for Frank. Frank wasn’t actually in the room, which was a surprise. He pulled off his soaked shirt and pulled on a new one.

Then he heard a voice.

“Hey! Jacob!”

Jacob whipped around, searching for the source of the voice. There was nobody else in the room. A bubble of hope crawled into his chest. _The rumors were real. People from behind someone’s door _were_ looking for them._ “...Millard?”

“Yes! We’ve been looking for you! Your parents didn’t tell us _anything_! We’ve been looking in hospitals all across the country! Then Olive spotted this place from the air and recognized it from this pamphlet she saw in your parents’ house. Everyone’s waiting out in the woods. Come on, let’s go.”

“Wait, the _woods_?” Jacob felt panic spark, interrupting the hope. “_Everyone_ here goes to the woods when they’re stressed! And what about Horace? Isn’t he scared of owls?”

“It’s broad daylight, Jacob! No owls!” Millard’s hand found Jacob’s shoulder, resting lightly there so Millard could guide Jacob without anyone noticing Jacob being dragged along by an invisible boy. “Come on.”

_Everyone here is going to be so jealous._ Jacob thought. _I get to go home. To Emma._ “Okay. Coming.” He allowed Millard to drag him away, following him as best he could. “But the others are going to be _found_ in the woods. The people here are… they always go to the woods when they’re stressed out. If you’re hiding in the woods, _you will be found_, even if it’s by accident.”

“We’d better hurry up, then.” Millard said, his hand tightening on Jacob’s shoulder and starting to speed up.

“Wait! What about- _how_ are you not _dead_ right now?”

“We figured it out! It’s fine! Let’s go! No time to waste! You’re going to be our guide! We’ve already mucked up a few things- Enoch and Emma and Olive all got caught on normals’ cameras. It’s brilliant, what these modern phones can do. Inconvenient sometimes, but overall brilliant.”

“I- right, um, okay."

Jacob practically ran through the house with Millard’s invisible hand clutching his shoulder, running out of the house, across the lawn, into the woods, past everyone who used the woods as a place of refuge, which was nearly all of the students at Eleanor West’s, and straight to a small clearing with a golden light between two trees.

Smiling broadly, Jacob went into the loop, straight towards home.


End file.
